


The Long Way Up

by blazichu



Category: Mystery Skulls (Band), Mystery Skulls Animated
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Gen, Vivi remembers Lewis but not the cave, cloudy with a chance of scattered ot3 implications, only Mystery knows Lewis is dead
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-01-11
Updated: 2018-03-14
Packaged: 2018-09-16 20:02:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9287642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blazichu/pseuds/blazichu
Summary: When Lewis pulled away from his body, skewered at the bottom of some nameless cave, his only thought had been to get even.He didn't get even.





	1. First Down

**Author's Note:**

> The premise for this story was based on this post: http://everystarstorm.tumblr.com/post/118986253485/my-brain-just-keeps-coming-up-with-stuff-anyway

Lewis didn't rise with noble intentions.

It was absolute fury on his mind first and foremost-- a standard reaction that he'd fought almost every day of his life and failed to combat in death. Where the urge to lash out first came from, he didn't know. There were a lot of things he didn't know about himself, and there were probably more now.

The fact remained: when Lewis pulled away from his body, skewered at the bottom of some nameless cave, his only thought had been to get even.

He didn't get even.

What he _did_ get was a flying high-five through the face, graciously provided by the same hand that had pushed him from the cliff not thirty seconds prior. Stunned into inaction, he watched the limb sail downwards and, spite not fully forgotten, was disappointed when it failed to stick the landing he'd made. As an afterthought, he glanced at the rock shelf.

The only conscious being on the ledge tensed up, caught in the act and, though Lewis wasn't aware of it, he backpedalled in thin air at the sight of its bloodied muzzle. The monster took a step forward. For the first time, the factors started adding up. Though he wasn't entirely sure why he did it, Lewis charged forward to pose a somewhat incorporeal obstacle between the beast and Arthur's bleeding body.

In hindsight, maybe the sight of a disembodied arm flying through the air should have set off some alarms.

Behind the glasses-- _glasses?_ \-- its wide eyes relaxed. Tails waving lazily in the gloom, it stalked forward and snagged the cuff of Lewis' sleeve without ever pausing in its march. Automatically, Lewis tried to snatch his hand away-- already intimately acquainted with fatal injuries and wayward arms by this point-- but the monster grumbled at him and something furry bounced off the back of his head, followed by another smack when he tried it again.

It seated itself near Arthur's head, tugging Lewis down with it as it sat, and carefully angled itself so it was almost nose-deep in the wound. Trails of impossibly thick drool came away with it as it released its grip on Lewis' sleeve, and he was torn between absolute disgust in the monster spit or unbridled horror in the fact that _oh god there was blood everywhere and that thing just stuck his hand against the source._

"Get angry first," Someone, somewhere said, "And grossed out later."

Oh, _now_ they wanted anger? He'd momentarily lost anger somewhere between being beaned with a flying hand and reenacting one of Vivi's horror movies.

"No, that's not going to cut it. Lewis, are you even listening to me?"

Lewis flinched in surprise and jerked backward, a wave of pink heat dissipating in his wake. He shook his hand with wild abandon, frantically trying to get the blood off of it, and missed the exact moment when it simply fell away, _through_ his hand in certain areas.

"I… suppose that also works."

The monster-- the monster that he'd _almost forgotten about_ \-- looked to its paws and gave one a dainty flick , but didn't seem to mind that the edge of the blood pool had slowly crept towards it, marring even more of its fur.

"Never doubt a germaphobic human's ability to cauterize something."

The creature snorted and started back to its feet, casting him what almost looked like a teasing glance. "Ah, I'm sorry. You're not a germaphobe, are you? You're a 'food service worker'."

And now the monster was talking. Vivi would be having a field day.

…where _was_ Vivi?

It stopped midway through settling Arthur on its back-- using its prehensile tails to steady him-- and its face fell. "Though I suppose you aren't _human_ anymore, either."

Among the number of things Lewis 'wasn't', listening ranked high on the list. In fact, Lewis wasn't even there anymore, already racing down the uppermost pathway and past the fork in the cave. The creature went unobserved as it raised its head and hissed backwards from ten before following at a more sedate pace.

As it walked, it cast a critical eye over the new scorch marks decorating the stone.

Lewis didn't afford it more than a glance when it caught up to him, busying himself with tending to Vivi. She didn't look hurt, which-- after Arthur-- was something of a minor miracle, but remained unresponsive no matter how he tried to wake her. Eventually, he settled for lifting her up off the ground, held safely against his chest.

That was when his attention was drawn downwards, to the bottom of the cave.

For several seconds he stood, speechless, and tried to process what had just happened.

The monster stepped forward, matching his footing at the edge of the cliff. It was lower than _the_ cliff, but offered the same view. With one major exception.

 "It was my fault, truth be told." To his right, the beast sighed. "For what it's-- Lewis?"

Lewis nodded numbly, unable to tear his gaze away from the sea of stalagmites.

"Fantastic. That makes two incapacitated humans and one ghost in shock." One of the tails stopped waving lazily about and struck him in the shoulder. "Wake _up_ , Lewis! You can have a metaphysical crisis once we've gotten out of here."

When that failed, the tail took a different approach and knocked his feet out from under him. Though, gravitationally, it had little effect, it did what it was meant to.

For several baffling seconds, Lewis blinked up at the stone ceiling, knocked off balance but not out of the air. The weight in his arms reminded him of Vivi's presence and, finally, he looked back at the beast that had been trying to engage him in conversation.

His attention flicked from the jingling dog tag at the monster's throat to its eyes. Understanding tugged at him, though he was hesitant to accept it.

Unsure whether it was a question or a statement, Lewis managed to croak, "Mystery."

He hummed the affirmative and tugged at Lewis' ankle with the same tail that had hit him a moment prior, bringing him back down to ground-level. "Remember what I said about that metaphysical crisis. Now isn't the time. If you would?"

Mystery looked from Vivi's unconscious form back to him, expectant, and, without realizing it, Lewis moved to hold her more securely. The weight of Mystery's stare didn't lessen.

"I can carry Vivi. You should take Arthur-- I suspect you'll jostle him less than I would."

Lewis tensed at the suggestion. "I've got her."

"Don't be so petty; you're both victims here."

The spike of anger that flared through him wasn't entirely unfamiliar, but notes of it struck an odd chord-- something inhuman that would have been frightening if he hadn't been its source.  

Mystery's ears wilted and he closed his eyes. "I-- understand where you're coming from right now, but you have to try to understand as well. You're dead and there's nothing to be done for that, but we _can_ help Arthur. Even if you won't act for friendship, are you going to let the demon that killed you have him too?"

Lewis was the first to break eye contact, reluctantly entrusting Vivi's wellbeing to her loyal dog, and keeping his expression carefully blank as he gathered Arthur up in her stead.

He didn't know how to feel about this and he didn't want anyone else to know it.

Mystery kept pace next to him, neither of them inclined to say anything about the situation they'd been literally thrust into. The heavy silence followed them well past the mouth of the cave and into the van, dulled only by the engine's roar and the crunch of dirt beneath tires.

Even that faded, leaving a set of tire tracks and a growing pool of blood at the cave's nadir.


	2. As Above So Below

Three blocks away from Tempo’s nearest hospital, Mystery barked Lewis out of his stupor.

It wasn’t a normal bark, which would have been jarring enough, but a bark of, “Pull over.”

Though it took a second to wrestle his voice back into submission, Lewis managed a weak, “What?”

Mystery’s steady pacing went silent.

“This is as far as we can take them. Pull over and dial emergency services. ” He reared up, forelegs braced against the front seats, and looked down his nose at Lewis. “We can still help, but it’ll have to be remotely, where the humans can’t see us. I’m a dog and, thus, won’t be allowed into a hospital, and you look like literal death.”

It took another few seconds for Mystery’s reasoning to get through to Lewis, by which point he’d already eased off the gas. Numbly, he looked down.

“Do _not_.” With a super-canine swiftness, Mystery had clambered into his lap. “You’re allowed to have your metaphysical crisis _after_ we’ve settled this mess and not a moment sooner. Now please, dial. I’d do it, but I find myself lacking both thumbs and a phone on which to use them.”

He took a deep breath, but it turned into a sharp string of curses halfway through.

“…not that you have a cellphone at the moment, either.”

“Move,” Lewis said softly, voice somehow much steadier than he’d expected. “I can get Vivi’s cell, but not while you’re on my lap.”

Just as suddenly as he’d appeared, Mystery was gone, back to pacing the length of the van.

“Once you’ve got it,” His footfalls neared, paused, and then grew steadily distant again, “Dial and let me handle the conversation. While I’m doing that, make sure Vivi’s buckled into the driver’s seat; it has to look like she and Arthur were the only people here.”

Midway through sitting Vivi up, Lewis rolled his eyes, but wasn’t aware of the sneer crossing his features until Mystery snapped at him again. “And stop making that face! This isn’t an appropriate situation to humor your blossoming grudge.” 

‘Grudge’? Though he’d spent the entire drive trying to make sense of everything that was happening, that was something that hadn’t occurred to Lewis. Ghosts had grudges—or, well, some ghosts did.

Distracted, he punched in the numbers on Vivi’s phone and slid it onto the floor in back.

They’d encountered a couple of ghosts—never anything as solid or as… _real_ as he felt, but enough for humans to recognize. Both had been skittish things, as fearful of the living as vise-versa. He couldn’t imagine their unfinished business had to do with any kind of grudge.

…but his did, didn’t it?

In anger, he’d found the strength to defy death.

He pushed the thought away and fussed with how Vivi’s unconscious weight pulled against the seatbelt. What had happened to her? She’d been out for so long, but looked just fine. He ran a hand through her hair, checking that there weren’t any hidden lumps just once more and, again, came up empty.

Maybe… maybe a lack of oxygen? The cave wasn’t terribly deep—

It had been deep _enough,_ an insistent, angry part of him chimed in.

Lewis forcibly kept his hands from clenching and settled Vivi against the backrest.

The cave wasn’t terribly deep, but maybe it had been cordoned off due to the presence of natural gasses. That could explain why she’d passed out without any visible trauma.

From the back, he heard the small cacophony of buttons all being pressed at once.

“I… have no idea whether it’s off or not.”

Now _there_ was a question he could answer. Lewis moved to vault the passenger seat, but was met with an unexpected lack of resistance, fell through said seat and then through the van’s floor. He stared at the old pavement until his brain caught up with the rest of him, at which point he decided this wasn’t the place to be. On a hunch, he stood up and found himself back inside.

“It’s still on.”

Mystery pawed at the phone again, but it didn’t accomplish much. Almost as an afterthought, he padded over, grabbed Lewis’ sleeve, and tugged him the rest of the way into the cabin. On most days, Lewis would have been concerned about drool—even earlier _that_ day he’d been concerned about drool, albeit in a foggy kind of way—but for the time being, there was just so _much_ vying for his attention that he didn’t have any to spare.

Mind elsewhere, he didn’t notice as he sunk right back through the undercarriage, up to his knees.

Absently, he reached for the abandoned cell and hung up.

Mystery gave a curt nod and turned on all four heels; his eyes lingered on Arthur as he padded toward the back doors. Lewis deliberately kept his gaze on the opposite side of the cabin as he followed suit, slogging through the van’s inner-workings not unlike the haunted bog they’d once visited.

When he slammed the door shut, it felt like he’d walked into a different reality, like he’d never be able to go back home—and, in a way, he had. Suddenly, Mystery wasn’t a dog. Suddenly, Lewis wasn’t human. Nothing would ever be the same.

That little, incessant voice reminded him that it was all Arthur’s fault. Arthur had killed him, and was laying defenseless in the van. What was he doing trying to save that snake’s life? What if he turned on Vivi? What if, in sparing Arthur, Lewis was condemning her to the same fate he’d suffered?

His heart raced and he was distracted by a flutter of gold at the corner of his vision. He glanced down, heedless of Mystery’s earlier warning.

Mystery nudged his leg, urging him away. “Just a few minutes more, Lewis, that’s all I’m asking. Help is on the way, and we can’t let you be seen.”

Belatedly, Lewis realized that was a great idea. He really shouldn’t be seen. By anyone.

Including himself.

Unfortunately, it was too late for that.

\--

Mystery sighed internally, watching Lewis press one trembling hand to the hole in his chest. They’d been so close to making a clean getaway—whether it was shock or Lewis’s agreeable nature, he’d gotten them away from the cave without further incident. Now that everyone else was situated, the only thing left was to find a safe place for him to come to terms with what had happened.

The middle of the road was _not_ one such place.

Mystery called to him again, but the ghost was unresponsive—and he could understand why.

Lewis was a mess. It wasn’t just the ragged crater that tore through him or the bloodied clothes; if not for those two identifying features, he’d have been completely unrecognizable.

Mystery had never witnessed the creation of a ghost before, and found himself at a loss. Was it an extension of the shock he’d suffered? A revenant’s natural instincts warring against the person Lewis had been in life? Or was this just the way a ghost settled its form? He didn’t know whether he should be concerned or not, but erred on the side of caution.

Regardless of what was happening, they would _not_ be standing in the street and waiting to be run over.

He leapt, grabbed Lewis’ sleeve, and made a break for it at top canine speed without any hint of resistance.

When he decided they were far enough into the greenbelt to stop, Mystery finally let go.

No response. Not good.

He tried nudging Lewis’ leg again and, when that inevitably failed, sat down with a huff. What was he supposed to do? He may have been of the supernatural persuasion, but he was no paranormal encyclopedia. Without meaning to, he let out a pitiful whine.

Zero for three. What kind of self-appointed guardian did that make him? The answer, clearly, was an ineffectual one. If only he’d recognized the presence in the cave sooner—he could have done more to save them. He could have done more than just pick up the pieces.

But there was very little to be done with that kind of attitude. He’d already done everything he could for Arthur and Vivi for the time being— but Lewis was another matter. He could still prevent Lewis from becoming a danger to himself and others; he just had to lead the ghost back to who he was.

Mystery flared his energy. It was brief and controlled, not a transformation, but a localized beacon.

Pinpricks of light burned back into existence in Lewis’ empty eye sockets, unfocused, and were followed by a whirlwind of fire. It sputtered out quickly, unsustainable so early in death, but licks of flame lingered in the air around his skull.

“Lewis? Are you with me?”

Slowly, he inclined his skull, one hand still subconsciously grasping at the torn material of his vest.

No—no, that wasn’t what he was clutching. There was a flash of gold peeking through his bony fingers—bright, then dark, then bright again. As much as he wanted to satisfy his curiosity, Mystery didn’t feel like playing proverbial tug-of-war at the moment; he had more important matters to attend to.

“Do you remember what happened to you?”

“I was killed.” The fuzzy halos of light sharpened. “By Arthur. He pushed me.”

“No,” Mystery said as gently as he could, “Not by Arthur—by a demon.”

There was a rumble of humorless laughter. “If that’s what you want to call him.”

Mystery stood up, but looking Lewis in the eye from his vantage point was hard enough; trying to look down his nose at him while craning his head _up_ was an exercise in futility. He sighed. “I don’t know what you’re going through right now, Lewis, but trust me when I say that I _do_ know you’ll regret it if you start down this path.  You don’t have all of the information right now, and I want you to understand what happened today so you can make the right choice.”

“Sounds to me like you’re talking to the wrong person. Right and wrong are pretty subjective, but I’m sure we both know what _murder_ counts as.”

Mystery’s ears wilted. “Lewis, I… everything that happened today—I would do anything I could to make it right, but I can’t, and I’m going to carry that with me for as long as I live.” He counted it as a minor miracle that Lewis was still too shellshocked to poke fun at the unfortunate choice of words, or to take it as a slight. “Right now, all I want is to save you that pain. You came back to get revenge, didn’t you? If you enact it right now, you’ll fail on two counts: you won’t punish the culprit, and you’ll kill an innocent man.”

He hesitated and tried to make sense of the ghost’s blank wall of a face. “I know you don’t believe me, but just… wait. I’ve been asking that of you a lot tonight, but nothing good comes of making such heavy decisions in haste. You’ve just died and you’re not thinking clearly; I know you’re smarter than this.”

Lewis shifted ever so slightly, skull tilting downward to consider Mystery. He was thinking about it, at least, and that was just what Mystery had been hoping for.  

“Do this one last favor for me: take the time to pull yourself together. Visit your family. Visit Vivi. Visit Arthur if you can handle it. If you reach the same conclusion with a clear head, I swear that I won’t stop you. Not even for your own sake.”


	3. A Steady Decline

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Emetophobia trigger warning for this chapter; nothing graphic, but just a heads-up.

Lewis wasn’t sure what he should have felt as he stared after the empty van.

That wasn’t to say that he didn’t know what he _did_ feel watching it from afar, hesitant to leave the safety of the thicket. He was angry, and it burned in every facet of his being, screaming to be let loose upon the person most deserving.

It was only as he reached the edge of the trees that his momentum began to slow.

What was he even planning to _do_? His anger was useless here. Unless he felt like unleashing it upon the mostly-innocent van, all he could do was sit and stew in his fury.

For a couple of fleeting seconds, he seriously considered roasting the van, just on principle.

Logically, he knew doing that wouldn’t solve anything. It wouldn’t even make him feel better, but the searing rage in his chest insisted that he try it anyway—and it was hard to say no, even when all the evidence was stacked against it.

He knocked his skull on the tree he’d been leaning against, frustrated not only with the situation he’d literally been pushed into, but also with himself. Beyond the obvious, what was _wrong_ with him? Was this just how he was supposed to… well, not live, but _exist_ now? It was terrible. He could barely get a handle on his own thoughts and feelings—and of that, the only thing he could make out was anger.

He thought he’d come to an understanding with his temper in life. In death, it seemed to have other ideas.

He was just—just so _lost_. For a handful of seconds, his only goal had been to get back at Arthur, but… he’d helped save him instead. And it hadn’t even been Mystery’s influence—sure, he’d taken advantage of the situation, but even before cauterizing the wound, it had been Lewis’ choice to step between his murderer and a monster.

If he hadn’t been able to let Arthur die from the start, why was he even _here_?

Lewis didn’t want to think about that right now, but all roads, inevitably, led back to his death. ‘Pull yourself together’, Mystery had said, but that wasn’t the problem. The problem was that his thoughts were so _compressed_ , each one twisting and trying to get free long enough for him to make sense of it, but pushing against others as they did so, inadvertently making it all that much harder to understand anything.

Now he understood why the bog ghosts had been so elusive. Who would want to deal with supernatural tourists when they were trying to settle a war in their own head?

The space between his eyes throbbed, and he lifted his skull; it was silly, but at least he could try to alleviate the physical pressure before working through the emotional tensions.

Nothing had changed out on the road. The van was still frustratingly un-charred, but that shouldn’t have come as any surprise. If he wasn’t going to take matters into his own hands, who would?

Experimentally, he lifted one hand from the bark and flexed his fingers, and belatedly realized that he had no idea how the fire had come to him in the first place. So no. No burning vehicles at his hands. In a weird way, not being able to do it was a relief; it absolved him of the responsibility to choose a side.

His father always said that not making a choice was a choice, too. What would a non-choice mean for his one-sided war against the van? What would it mean for his agreement with Mystery? If he held off until he had a more complete understanding, but never found it, didn’t that just mean that he’d decided against taking revenge? Suddenly, the deal seemed more weighted than it had before.

And that brought him to Mystery.

Mystery was a whole different beast in the most literal sense, and, as was the case with most things right now, Lewis didn’t know what to make of him. Did he mean well? He’d insisted that Lewis rethink things before going after Arthur again—and claimed that it was for Lewis’ own benefit—and seen to it that both Vivi and Arthur got help, but… he’d also been the source of Arthur’s injury. What was the point in—

Subconsciously, Lewis’ hand rose to cover his jaw and, steeling himself, he went further down that rabbit hole.

What was the point in ripping Arthur’s arm off if he’d just turned around and rushed the man to the hospital afterwards? It was a valid question, but it was also just as easy to ask, ‘If you’re going to turn around and kill him later, why bother protecting him in the first place?’

Nope. This was about Mystery’s motives, not Lewis’. Lewis was already well aware of his contradictory actions, and had no explanation for them.

Regardless of what ‘side’ Mystery was on, it was probably best not to get too comfortable with him; he’d _already_ proven that he was a threat. Lewis had only seen the aftermath, but the locket hovering near his lapel gave a nervous flutter at the memory of a beast with a bloody muzzle.

He turned his back on the road and leaned against the trunk; one set of fingertips dug into its bark while the other hand slowly migrated from his jaw to the quivering locket.

If at all possible, he’d like to stay on Mystery’s good side. Or, at least, the grey area that wasn’t his good side, but wasn’t his bad side either.

The tightness in his chest coiled further, and there was something else he was able to recognize: fear.

Fear and anger. Now that was a recipe for disaster.

He slid down the tree trunk and, with a clipped laugh, realized that those twisting emotions occupied the newly-renovated space in his being.

It took several minutes before Lewis recognized that the laughter he was choking on had turned into a series of breathy sobs. He was a mess—a mess of conflicting emotions and intentions, a mess of blood and bone.

He drew his knees up as if to hide the source of it all, and miserably rested his forehead against them.

Nearby underbrush crackled underfoot—or underpaw, as it were—but Lewis didn’t bother looking up.

Great. That was just what he needed right now: more contradictory feelings.

“Something’s wrong.” He said, more to himself than his company, using the words to swallow back another bubble of distraught laughter. “Something’s wrong with me.”

_Why_ was he seeking out the presence of something so… unpredictable? He’d thought he could trust Arthur, and look where that had gotten him. Now he was just _sitting there_ , waiting to see what else a rogue element was going to do.

There was more crunching as Mystery padded nearer and sat down.

The locket beat heavily in Lewis’ hand. One of his remaining survival instincts kicked in, and he cupped the other around it, too, pressing it safely to his collarbone.

Out on the road, a vehicle slowed as it passed the van, and eventually sped up as its owner’s curiosity was sated.

Mystery rested his chin on Lewis’ knee, and the heart skipped a beat.

“Nothing’s wrong with you. Even if something was, it wouldn’t be your fault.” He finally said. “It occurs to me that I haven’t been especially mindful of what you’re going through. I don’t regret prioritizing the way I did, and I hope you understand my reasoning, but that danger has passed. It’s time to deal with another. I realize I’m telling you this far too late, but your wellbeing is also a priority of mine.”

Lewis refused to look at him. The flattery was obvious—it had been when they spoke further in the greenbelt, and it was just as blatant now. But, despite all of his misgivings, he was finding it hard to distance himself from Mystery when everyone else was already so far away; logic be damned, he did _not_ want to be alone in the world. Not again.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t save you.”

Paradoxically, his nonexistent breathing hitched and his fingers tightened around the locket; the coil began to wind itself again, so taut he felt it might snap.

“S-stop.” He somehow ground out, managing to get through everything else warring for what little space it could reach.

The weight of Mystery’s head disappeared.

Lewis remembered wondering, as he made his way toward the road, whether or not their agreement had been a ploy to see him to rest—to wait long enough for the fire that sustained him to go out. Maybe it had been another case of mixed signals: exorcise him to save him.

Somehow, he had been left with nothing but fear, hatred and the paranoia they bred. It was no way to exist.

So maybe, if this reality was so unbearable, it really _would_ be in his best interest.

He curled in on himself, unable to make the decision—but, of course, _inaction was a decision too_.

Rough paw pads brushed at his exposed elbow.

“Let go.” Mystery said, voice uncommonly soft, even for the little of it Lewis had heard.

For a second, Lewis was sure it was a plea to move on, but insistent—and _improperly clipped_ —nails scratched his wrist, reminding him that he was still holding something in a death-grip.

“Lewis, you’re hurting yourself. Let go of it.”

He could feel the joints in his hands creak as he slackened the hold; the steadily building pressure in his chest came to a sudden halt.

…was it really that simple?

Mystery nudged the exposed flash of gold, tutting over the spider web of cracks on its surface; his nose was cold and the sensation almost made Lewis jump, but he clung so stubbornly to his epiphany that the instinct to protect the heart fell by the wayside.

That unbearable tension—had he been causing it the whole time?

If he could just release his metaphorical grasp, he could think again. He could get back to—

Get back to…

Beside him, Mystery took a sharp breath. “What did you just do?”

Lewis let go of the locket entirely and turned both empty hands palm-up.

“Not what I meant.” Mystery nudged it again, angling it so Lewis could see. One of the shallow cracks had gone deeper than the rest. It hadn’t been like that a moment ago. He sighed and sat up straight, giving Lewis a pointed look, “If this is about Arthur again—”

Lewis flinched and sagged against the tree trunk.

Briefly, he was hit by the feeling of sitting under his mother’s disapproving stare. It didn’t mesh well with the reality that it wasn’t a human woman watching him, but something that wasn’t quite a dog.

“Don’t—don’t say his name.”

There was a long silence, ended by a disappointed snuffle.

 “What can I do to help you?”

Lewis didn’t know. The memory of his mother didn’t fit in with fear, anger, or anything in between; he was having a hard time processing it. He didn’t know what he felt anymore, or how Mystery could help… but quiet would be nice. Stability. Something to help balance out the volatility inside.

The urge to keep burning, to keep the coals hot, rebelled; it wouldn’t be stability, it would be stagnation. That was unacceptable.

_What could happen to Vivi if he let this go unpunished? What had he already been to late—too busy being_ killed _—to save her from? How could he even entertain the thought of letting anything else happen to her?_

His hands itched to curl in on themselves again. He kept them still.

“I want to go home.”

“Then we take you home.”

Finally, Lewis looked him in the eye. “ _How_?”

“I’ll walk. I suspect you’ll float."

A harsh laugh escaped a throat that didn’t exist anymore. “You know what I meant. If my sisters saw me like this—or, or even mom and dad…”

“Then don’t let them see you.” Mystery said, as though it were obvious. “It’s not ideal, I realize that, but even if your appearance wasn’t a problem, are you really up for all the questions you’d be faced with?”

Lewis leaned against the tree and closed his eyes, imagining, for a moment, that he was back on the front porch. There had been questions then, too—a lot of them. Most of them from people far less understanding than his parents. He hadn’t had any of the answers they’d been looking for.

This time, he did. Probably.

…maybe not, if Mystery was to be believed, but that was still up for debate.

For the time being, he gave it up. It didn’t matter right now.

“How?” He asked again, softly.

“First, we get moving. Then I teach you how to disappear.”

\--

Arthur had been just a little bit in love with Lewis since his twelfth birthday.

He had never been one for parties—not when it was just him and Lance—but every year, they would mark the occasion by trying to bake a cake and, if that failed, bid a hasty retreat to one of Tempo’s bakeries. Arthur had been overwhelmed nearly to the point of tears the first time the Peppers had sent one over with Lewis.

So it hadn’t been an official get-together that year, as Lewis carefully deposited a cake on the counter and Arthur tried to make sense of the violin case his friend had been struggling to balance on the way in.

He’d understood with the first strains of music: a song he only recognized from visiting the Paradiso on weekends, and only bits and pieces, since Lewis’ practice—or composition, as he’d eventually find—would come to an abrupt halt as soon as he realized Arthur was there. If the song had shaken at times, Arthur hadn’t noticed; all he could think was that Lewis had poured his attention into writing it—all for _him_.

He hadn’t exactly fallen that day, but he’d certainly stumbled.

And now Lewis was dead.

Arthur had killed him.

It was the very first thing he remembered upon waking; the rest of the night was fuzzy—most of his present was fuzzy, for that matter—but he remembered that one fact with perfect clarity.

The nurse tending to him panicked when he woke and immediately threw up, but the doctor didn’t seem surprised. She said something about shock and busied herself giving orders just outside the room. Arthur didn’t care. He didn’t care about why he was here, or how long he’d been there. Concern for Vivi buzzed amongst the background noise his thought process had devolved into, but the parts of his brain that still worked told him _hospital. If I’m okay, she’s okay._

Lewis was not okay.

He gagged again, but managed to choke the bile down.

Arthur’s world had suddenly become very small, little more than guilt and self-hatred confined to a hospital bed. How could he have done that? How could he have done that to someone he—someone he _loved_?

His jumbled thoughts produced the memory of two fistfuls of fabric—a measure of comfort as they wandered in somewhere they definitely didn’t belong. It soured as his memory jumped to the same fabric pressed against the flat of his palm.

The monitor beside him screeched, flagging a different nurse to come in and prod at him. He ignored this one too… or would have, if it weren’t for the sudden iciness of something snaking through his veins—snaking through his _arm_. He snatched it back and made a move to physically restrain it, to keep it all from happening again, but there was nothing to grip it with.

His other arm wasn’t there anymore.

Arthur sat, trembling, at the edge of his shrunken world as the medication began to take effect. It seemed somehow appropriate. It had been a cliff before, and it was a cliff now.

He almost fought against the sedative—against the poison in his arm and the blackness that followed. He was fine on the overhang, waiting for the inevitable. Let someone else fill his role; he couldn’t be that person this time.

He almost fought against the sedative, but one simple fact made him accept it instead:

Lewis was dead, and Arthur had killed him. He hadn’t forgotten it for one second. He wouldn’t allow himself to.

The mantra saw him through his fleeting trip into the waking world and safely back to sleep, where he was greeted by the gleam of teeth and snapping of bone.

He welcomed it with one open arm.


End file.
